ObjectiveTo investigate expression levels of thymidylate synthase (TS), excision repair cross-comple-menting gene 1 (ERCC1), β-tubulin 3 (TUBB3), ribonucleotide reductase subunit 1 (RRM1)in different pathological types of non-small cell lung cancer (NSCLC), and evaluate detection strategies of above genes for individualized chemotherapy of NSCLC. MethodsWe retrospectively analyzed clinical data of 94 NSCLC patients who underwent radical resection in Department of Thoracic Surgery of Beijing Friendship Hospital from February 2010 to October 2012. Messenger ribonu-cleic acid (mRNA)expression levels of TS, ERCC1, TUBB3 and RRM1 were examined by immunohistochemistry. ResultsThere were 91 patients (96.81%)with low mRNA expression of TS, 90 patients (95.74%)with low mRNA expression of ERCC1, 59 patients (62.77%)with low mRNA expression of TUBB3, and 48 patients (51.06%)with low mRNA expression of RRM1. There was no statistical difference in mRNA expression levels of TS, ERCC1, TUBB3 or RRM1 between adenocarcinoma and non-adenocarcinomas (P > 0.05). The percentage of low mRNA expression of TUBB3 in adenocarcinoma was significantly lower than that in non-adenocarcinomas (58.21% vs. 74.07%). Among patients with same pathological types of NSCLC, mRNA expression levels of TS, ERCC1 and TUBB3 were all positively correlated with mRNA expression of RRM1 (correlation coefficient all greater than 0.80). ConclusionFor individualized chemotherapy of NSCLC, when selecting gene detection, mRNA expression levels of ERCC1 and TS need not be detected and can be considered as low expression by experience, mRNA expression levels of TUBB3 in adenocarcinoma and RRM1 in all pathological types of NSCLC should be routinely examined. For non-adenocarcinoma patients, whether or not to examine mRNA expression level of TUBB3 can be decided in a comprehensive manner.